W4RA, Web Alliance for Regreening in Africa

W4RA’s mission is to support farmer-managed regreening activities specifically by enhancing information, communication and knowledge sharing for rural development. It does so by developing and field deploying innovative ICT communication applications that link mobile phones, radio, Internet/Web, with the aim to successfully deliver useful locally relevant voice services and web apps to rural communities – also in remote regions and over long distances.

Thus, W4RA provides an important dimension in the communication strategy needed to spread and scale-up regreening. W4RA is an interdisciplinary network collaboration of scientists and professionals in information and computer sciences, informatics, software development, organization, business, and communication. It is hosted as an R&D and education program at the Network Institute of the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. Since its inception in 2009, W4RA has been inspired by the African Regreening Initiatives.